The Haricot-Weevil 
so young. It roams about, anxious to find 
board and lodging as soon as possible. 
It attains its object, for the most part, 
within the twenty-four hours. I see the 
worm making a hole in the tough skin of the 
seed; I watch its efforts; I catch sight of it 
half-sunk in the beginning of a gallery whose 
entrance is dusty with white flour, the refuse 
from the boring. It works its way in and 
penetrates into the heart of the seed. Its 
evolution is so rapid that it will emerge in 
the adult form in five weeks’ time. 
This hasty development permits several 
generations to take place in the course of the 
year. Ihaveseen four. On the other hand, 
an isolated couple supplied me with a family 
of eighty. Let us consider only half this 
number, to allow for the two sexes, which I 
take to be equally represented. At the end 
of the year, the couples resulting from this 
source will therefore be represented by the 
fourth power of forty, reaching in terms of 
larve the frightful total of over two and a 
half millions. What a heap of haricots such 
a legion would destroy! 
The larva’s methods remind us at all 
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